 |
|
Cole Mann - Stars - Race of the America's - New Castle Motorsports Park, New Castle, IN - May 30 - June 1, 2008 Written By: Cole Mann Racing 6/2/2008 - (Hewitt, NJ) -- This was Cole's second round of the Snap on Stars of Karting Series, The Race of the America's East/West. Once again Cole would be competing in STARS TaG and teaming with Nevoso Racing/San Yves Motorsports under the guidance of Jon Nevoso. Weather was very windy, but very sunny for Friday practice day. The day had its ups and downs for the Friday night heavy thunderstorms rolled in and a Tornado touched down! When arriving at the track on Saturday morning there was some destruction. Tents torn down, ripped off the side of tractor trailers and even some tents blown right out of the pits and into the fields. Luckily for our team nothing at all was damaged or lost. The STARS officials called a 2 hour delay so that the teams could get a chance to clean up and get ready for racing. Cole went out for practice and again seemed to be mid pack. When qualifying rolled around he ended up 16th out of 48 Karts. Due to the amount of karts the heat races worked as follows: The 48 Karts were divided up into 3 groups A, B and C. Heat 1 would be A vs B, Heat 2 would be A vs C and Heat 3 would be B vs C. Points would be added together to determine grid position for Sunday's finals. Also on Saturday they would be taking 36 drivers from the Heat Races and the rest would be going to an LCQ on Sunday. From the LCQ 6 drivers would transfer to the Finals capping the field at 42 TaG Karts.
Things were looking up for this young STARS Rookie. After 1 round of practice on the old tires on Sunday, Cole felt good with his Kart and the Track. Final #1 - After many failed start attempts and pole sitters being rotated a time or two the race finally got under way. Cole got an awesome start and went from 5th to 3rd in the first corner. This was a 15 lap final on a track that had lap times at 1 minute, 5 seconds. He had his work cut out for him. A few laps into the race Cole was passed and moved back to 4th. In front of him was Cabrara, Weigand & Saunders all seasoned veterans. They had the draft and started to pull away. Cole was all alone with no one to draft. As the top 3 started to dice for position Cole managed to gain on them. At about 5 laps left Cole was right there just waiting for the chance to make his move. 3 laps to go Cabrara dropped a wheel and got passed by everyone including Cole, this moved Cole into Podium Position 3rd spot. Saunders started to get away, but not Weigand. Cole was right on him and getting ready for any chance he could to take 2nd position. As they came down the long straight on the final lap Weigand moved over a bit to drive a defensive line. They were coming down with such great speed that Cole saw the opportunity to get right along side of Weigand and that is exactly what he did and passed him right before the checkered flag to finish off in 2nd Place! A nail biter of a race on the last lap. This would be Cole's first podium at a STARS Race. The team was thrilled and proud of his accomplishment. Final #2 - Again there were a few failed start attempts, but not as much as in Final #1. By turn 1 Cole would find himself going from 5th spot to 3rd by the first turn. This time his Kart was not cooperating as well as he would have liked. A few other changes should have been made before he went out in this final. The entire race he was finding that he had way too much rear grip due to so much rubber being laid down on the track by this point. Anyway there was a charge of fast drivers coming up behind Cole. He at one point would find himself back to 8th position. But he kept fighting and passing and got back up to 6th position for the remainder of the race and that is where he would finish for Final #2. Once again this was an incredible run for this 16 year old. Over all the entire team feels this was an extremely successful weekend for Cole Mann and his team. Cole credits a lot of his successful weekend on a team effort by working well with his dad Keith, Jon Nevoso and Michael. Cole would like to give special thanks to Jon Nevoso and Michael Ramirez for all of their help and support over the entire weekend. Cole would also like to thank his partners for their continued support of his racing career. Thanks to Nevoso Racing/San Yves Motorsports, Shupps Kart Shop, Doug Fleming, Savage Designs, World Wide Bearings, and Walters Web Design.
To learn more about Cole Mann Racing and the very successful future on the way, please visit our resume page and/or contact page. We would be happy to go in to detail with you about how motorsports marketing can help your company or business grow! |
 |
team as some practices the lap times would be fast and he would be in the top 10 fastest and other practices he would find himself mid pack. The day ended with the team feeling that Cole was someplace mid pack out of the 48 TaG drivers signed up to compete.
Cole was put into group A. So for the 12 lap Heat Race #1 he started in 12th spot on the grid. Things started to come together for Cole and his Maranello Kart was working great. He had a great start and just went forward. He managed to finish off the Heat in 3rd spot. In Heat Race #2 things went well also. He again started in 12th spot and managed to work his way up to finish off the race in 7th position. After all Heats were completed and scores were tallied, Cole would find himself starting the Finals on Sunday in 5th Position on the Grid!